


Left In Want Of Mercy

by JDylah_da_Kyllah



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Legends - All Media Types, Star Wars Legends: Jedi Apprentice Series - Jude Watson & Dave Wolverton, Star Wars Prequel Trilogy
Genre: Awkward Sexual Situations, Bittersweet Ending, Dark, Female-On-Male Rape, Flashbacks, Forbidden Love, Gen, Gentle Sex, Gentleness, Healing Sex, Heavy Angst, Hurt/Comfort, Jedi Code (Star Wars), Love, M/M, Male-Female Friendship, Master & Padawan Relationship(s), Mental Health Issues, Nightmares, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder – PTSD, Psychological Trauma, Rap, Rape Recovery, Self-Harm, Self-Hatred, Slow Burn, eRape Aftermath
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-14
Updated: 2021-03-14
Packaged: 2021-03-21 20:55:39
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 8
Words: 18,053
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30027741
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JDylah_da_Kyllah/pseuds/JDylah_da_Kyllah
Summary: Re-post from my deleted account. No less important.There is no ignorance; there is knowledge.There are some things one should never know . . .And Qui-Gon has no idea how to help Obi-Wan put the pieces back together, or if the young man he so deeply loves will ever return.Or: "Kingdom come, their will was done,and now the earth is far awayfrom any kind of heaven.Hallowed be these frozen fields,and every single one of usstill left in want of mercy . . . "
Relationships: Bant Eerin & Obi-Wan Kenobi, Kit Fisto & Qui-Gon Jinn, Qui-Gon Jinn/Obi-Wan Kenobi
Kudos: 9
Collections: Master Apprentice Archive, Star Wars





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> The title and "or" come from The Wailin' Jennys' ["Starlight"](https://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/wailinjennys/starlight.html).
> 
> Comments and thoughts are ever and always appreciated. Thank you very much for reading. <3

The hall is dark, choked with stricken terror: beings stumbling blindly, caught in the crosshairs of ricocheting blaster-fire, vibroblades snaking like gleaming fangs from shadows, darting, slicing flesh to bone. The floor is slick with gore, and Qui-Gon’s bootsoles find scant purchase there; more than once, deflecting bolts, distracted, dodging, he stumbles over the dying or dead and can offer little more than a fleeting prayer within the Force that they find peace. Cries of pain, of mortal fear, primordial, consume the air, snuffing out the discharge of pistols and rifles—even the thrum of his blade, the sole steady verdant light to half-illuminate the darkness. He can’t draw a breath without it being thickly-wrought: blood, vomit, excrement—the messiness of life and cortisol-spiked death.

The station is groaning, a giant wounded beast, durasteel struts bowing dangerously, cables snapping, sparks flickering in violent lives, short-lived. Qui-Gon takes notice of none of it.

How can he?

Where there should be _everything_ there’s—

Obi-Wan’s not dead.

No.

Qui-Gon would know it.

And even as Qui-Gon’s so faintly felt him over these past few days, it’s as if he’s less than shadow—as if he welcomes the spark and the flame and the blaster-bolt—as if he _wants_ to disappear, be found by none, not even his own Master, as if he wants to be swallowed by—

The Force jars into the empty space, _demanding_ , whirls him around: at his back, but a hairsbreadth distant, a woman’s crept up from behind, a lightwhip snarling about her feet like a living beast. Qui-Gon quells his surprise and readies himself, jaw set, swaying with his attacker’s motions—ready to leap, to skitter-step in a deadly dance—to rely more on Force-given agility than blade. But she’s no Ona Noblis, he’s pleased to discover—even as the whip curls about his neck before he ducks away, even as it leaves the smell of singed hair sharp within his nose—even as he feels a glancing, searing kiss against his cheek.

He finds that he doesn’t care about _that_ , either—

He’d know if Obi-Wan was dead.

The thought circles with the inexorable presence of a famished tuk’ata, the weight of a half-broken storm that sunders the horizon. Soon enough it will prey upon the light, upon the love that birthed it, and devour him if he isn’t careful—if he doesn’t dance around it with more skill and grace than around his opponent.

Again the whip flares at the corner of his sight; he weaves, stepping nimbly through its trap-snapped fleeting vice, realizing that the weapon’s equally deadly to the both of them. She isn’t trained, and that makes her all the more dangerous.

_You’ll do Obi-Wan no good if your worry gets you killed._

He takes to studying the woman, then, struck to brutal light and the sharp impressions of shadows between one moment and the next. His blade, her whip, the hail of blaster-fire—and those slivered finite moments of silence, of shadows, of darkness.

Though she isn’t skin and bones there’s an emaciated look to her—something in the flushed-pale, rounded cheeks, the eyes—something more than lack of flesh—and she reeks of spice and reels and half the time strikes at something only she can see. Briefly he considers _cho mai_ , only to realize that the station’s falling down around their heads: she’s in no state of body or mind to escape—and even if she did, the spice will consume her.

A Jedi must be prepared to take a life every time they draw their blade. Qui-Gon opens himself to the Force, to the life of her—the energy—the purest part of her that still remains, that moves as if to welcome him, to take his hand—and offers with a single thrust _shiak—_ mercy.

She throws back her head and lets a laugh become her dying breath, a smile profanely strung across her lips—as if glad, terribly weary and glad of the end.

At this, something shifts within the bond.

Subtle.

Less than a whisper from the depths of where Obi-Wan should-be/isn’t. Formless, wordless, hollow.

But something, but _there_.

Qui-Gon gathers himself, closes his eyes, entrusts every reflex in his body to the Force—and lets his mind, half-divorced from flesh, reach out. Briefly—terribly so—but enough—it _must_ be enough—

_< Where are you? Let me find you. Let me help you . . . >_

_< nothingnothing_nothing _—pleasedon’tseeme—pleasedon’tfindme—leavemealone—I’mnothere—don’tfindme—don’t_ touch _me—alone,I’malone,I’m_ nothing _—I’m— >_

_< Obi-Wan . . . it’s me. I’m here.>_ Qui-Gon offers himself, as if cupped hands, pouring the Light across the darkness: not merely the Force but all that Qui-Gon is, himself—he knows Obi-Wan sees him as green, and so yes, his own energy, all verdant things—and water, too—he knows how much his Padawan loves Bant—and so he draws to mind her silver eyes and the cool, clear waters of the Force, finding echoes in the Thousand Fountains—

Qui-Gon finds a lump gathering in his throat, an acrid coal, burning worse than the uncertainty, the fear. Knowing—and knowing nothing—is somehow much, much worse—

Yes, something terrible has happened.

And slowly he realizes that he won’t find Obi-Wan by looking for him—not as he was, not as he’s always known. The bond will do him no good, not if what’s familiar is all he hopes to find.

Qui-Gon hooks his lightsaber onto his belt, folds his arms into the sleeves of his robe, ignores the battle completely, and sets himself to searching quietly for the nothingness. The spark of life that tries its best to imitate the void.

* * *

There is a room. Neither manual lock nor forcefield. The door left half-ajar, as if someone almost hoped he’d find it. Qui-Gon reaches out, meets oil-slickened metal, near enough to burning-hot that he has more fear for the surrounding structural integrity than scalded skin: the walls are beginning to bow, to curve beneath the heat of the flames that climb and skitter around the trusses overhead. A hissed breath indrawn, no more, and the Force bids him stop, bids him be still, bids him reach and _reach_ with soft-green-Light and—

_< I’m here, Obi-Wan. It’s me. It’s only me. I promise you. I’m here, I’m here, I’m here.>_

To stride across the threshold with utter tenderness: slow-soft steps, as if the war outside does not exist, as if the station is but a broken-open sky, rain pouring down upon them—nothing more—as if they have all the time in the galaxy. As if they are safe.

_< I’m here.>_

The room is full of seedy, sickly light: the maw of a drain in the middle, witness to untold misery. Bare walls. Bare floor. Nothing else at all—and somehow the nothingness seems worse than if he were to find instruments of torture—just as if he’d dared to admit it, oh, the _nothingness_ with which Obi-Wan shrouds himself within the Force is almost worse than—

Qui-Gon draws a breath, sickness spiking at his throat.

At last his eyes alight on the furthest corner, to the place where all the shadows fall, to the figure, naked, back pressed against the duracrete, hands splayed, stance wide—every muscle tense—poised to run—but where? _What’s the point?_ ask the cerulean eyes, unseeing, twixt swollen, sleepless lids. _It will never end._

And the Jedi Knight, who’s seen much suffering and death, who’s seen the worst innumerable beings have to offer one another—and the best—must blink back tears, blinded for a moment by the Light of the Force that scatters there across these shattered remnants of his Padawan.

* * *

The shuttle is on autopilot, streaking through screaming blue-struck stars. Qui-Gon’s hands are shaking, clutching the bacta-soaked cloth. Obi-Wan sits at the edge of the antiquated biobed, half-shrouded in his Master’s robe, head bowed, his fingers clenched, scarcely breathing: striving, striving, still, to

disappear

“Obi-Wan.”

Qui-Gon’s forsaken trying to reach him through the bond; he’s taken himself someplace far too dark and deep for that. Instead he offers, on the one hand, soothing verdant energy, the echoes of the living Force, the silent-sweet-growing-things—cool, still waters—yes—does Obi-Wan know where they are bound? Coruscant with the Temple and the healing crystals and the Fountains and dearest Bant with silver eyes.

And on the other hand he offers this: slow movements, gentle words. Simple, concrete things that Obi-Wan can easily grasp.

“Do you know where you are?”

Shoulders buried beneath a robe too big shift in a shrug. Not a no. Not a yes. Qui-Gon purses his lips.

“Do you know that you’re not on the station anymore?”

A nod.

“Do you know who I am?”

A moment—a moment that seems the edge of a lifetime—before torn, swollen lips part softly, coaxing the words from that same dark-distant place: the echo of a stone thrown down a chasm, nothing more. Not the stone, or the rock it struck, or even the sound of its striking—but the echo.

“Yes, Master.”

Qui-Gon gives a nod his own, hoping his face is austere, hoping that it betrays nothing of the internal agony, the tautness in his throat, the uncertainty, the terror. He’s calmed many beings in his life: soothed the dying as they panicked at the fleeting light of life, terrified of the greater Light to come; he’s bathed the sick with no thought for himself; he’s washed the wounds of such as . . . these.

As him.

_My Padawan . . . my Obi-Wan._

He hopes—and knows well he should not—that when the station blew and scattered its skeleton across the hellish planet’s atmosphere, oh, that any and all who did this to him—

A quickly-sucked in breath, a slow exhale. Those cerulean eyes watch him from beneath the cowl of his robe, appraising him with hollow acerbity. He wrings out the cloth again, letting his hopes slip from such Dark places to one that seems, somehow, less-so: that someday his Padawan can feel anger of his own.

“I have a cloth with water and bacta,” he begins slowly. “We need to get you clean.”

“Yes, Master.”

“Would you like to wash yourself?”

The rag is taken in a grasp that seems numb and cold, unfeeling; Obi-Wan studies the cloth for a moment, eyes raking over the fibers, over the chapped skin of his hand, smeared with long-dried blood. There is no color in his face, and when again he speaks the words are slurred and soft.

“But I don't exist." A helpless gesture, downwards.

“Alright.” Qui-Gon cups his hands and the cloth is passed back, moist and cool and oh-so-slightly fragrant. He worries it a moment longer, struggling to quell the illogical panic that’s beginning to claw at his mind. Yes—he’s encountered many beings in such a state, and found no difficulty in speaking with them. There was _pain_ , of course—born from compassion—but never . . . this. Never such fear that a wrong word, a wrong move, a glance, a touch, could irrevocably shatter whatever of the young man’s left—

_Force help me._

The basics, then: slow motions, calm words . . . questions. Questions before everything.

“Obi-Wan, you have wounds which will likely become infected if we don’t treat them. The water and the bacta will help. The Force will help. The Light. Will you let me help you, too?”

Torn lips pursed a moment, waxing pale beneath encrusted blood. Another nod . . . but something subtle—something lost again behind blue eyes.

“May I touch your hand?”

Stained but uninjured: steady as he scrubs as gently as he can.

There are burns, shining, blistered, scattered across the young man’s skin. His shoulders, his back, his ribs, his thighs. At each of these places, the asking: at each of them a muted nod. The robe peeled back, the cloth wrung out again, pressed to wounded flesh. The fabric rearranged, just as it had been.

And then the places where Qui-Gon doesn’t know how to help. How to ask. Before he’d given Obi-Wan his robe, in that hellish room aboard the station, he’d seen . . .

His gaze falls on his Padawan’s lips, which have begun to tremble, as if the place they’ve come to now isn’t lost on him. The lacerations form a pattern, and a sickened twisting in his gut posits the thought that the wounds aren’t superficial. That something was forced into his mouth—

A weapon, perhaps—but lectures on physiology from his days as an Initiate drift back to him with agonizing clarity, unbidden—he doesn’t want to think about it, yet can think of nothing else now that his mind’s made the connection—

A male Zabrak has—

And the blood and fluids, drying, as they’d trickled down—encrusted now—a hellish latticework of agony—

He’d tried not to notice that, as Obi-Wan stumbled at his side through the dying, twisted station, barefoot. Bare, for all but his Master’s robe . . .

He’d tried not to notice many things, but the shuttle lights are bright and the reality is—

Convulsively he swallows, stares at the streaked-crimson rag in his hands, crouching down at last beside his Padawan, their gazes level, wondering if Obi-Wan’s so far withdrawn that—

_Does he mean it, when he tells me ‘yes’? Or does he agree because—?_

The one question to which he must believe the answer.

“Do you know who I am, Padawan?”

A flicker in the Force. There is no return from this, from what must be done. Whatever future is, it rests on this—the truth of it.

“Yes, Master.”

Obi-Wan stands, stiffly, dropping Qui-Gon’s robe without any pretense of emotion: no shame, no fear, no dread or apprehension: merely a dulled acceptance of whatever is to come.

A word, a glance, a touch, however fleeting, however slight.

Qui-Gon frowns at the dirtied rag, tosses it aside, reaches for a clean one, dipped in the basin of diluted bacta, smoother than water alone. His eyes flicker for a moment to Obi-Wan’s thighs; well enough he knows what damage has been done—but he sees then, too, that his genitals are crusted with something else.

As with a Zabrak’s spikes, his mind quickly formulates the answer, the thing he dares not think about. The flicker in the Force that had come at the lightwhip-wielder’s death . . .

Obi-Wan, so self-denying—ashamed even of waking in the morning to dried cum or to stiffness—who’d never, Qui-Gon’s sure, never so much as touched himself . . .

To have that wrested from him, too . . .

_Oh, Force._

_(Take a breath. The here and now. What’s done is done . . . What_ can _be done?)_

“Obi-Wan. If you tell me to stop, I will stop. Do you understand?”

A nod . . . the nod Qui-Gon isn’t sure he trusts. Not completely.

“I am going to start by washing off your legs. I won’t touch anywhere else without asking. Is that alright?”

“Yes, Master.”

The words almost make him sick, as if he has some part in what’s been done, even if of course it isn’t true and—

Qui-Gon can’t stop his hands from trembling again. Every muscle in Obi-Wan’s body is tense, the ribs grown still, the breath held tightly as a clenched fist, the pulse pounding out a wild, shallow time. The young man’s eyes are wide-pupilled and white-rimmed, all swallowed cerulean irises—and oh, so terribly, terribly empty, as if he isn’t really there.


	2. Chapter 2

She reeks of spice.

The ones who have come before, who brought him here, smell of sweat and lust and fear, as if some part of them has caught on to what Obi-Wan isn’t: not one of them, nor an insurrectionist who fights with pilfered rations and healing herbs rather than a blaster or a vibroblade. They are dark smears within the Force, sickly tainted some unholy shade, and their skin is greasy and their breath smells of rotting flesh.

They came and stripped him and left him untied, as if they wanted him to struggle. Each carried with them an electrostaff . . . Yes, wanting him to struggle and yet too frightened of what a desperate man might do.

But not a one of them has realized who he truly is.

Except for her.

She’s done no more on the first day then appraise her soldiers as restively they paw at him. She leaves well before sharp-nailed hands began to scratch and grasp at tender flesh, before half-spat insults become leering laughter, become wild shadows on the walls, become the sole dying light above their heads: blurring, burning, bright, as if the sole sun of a thousand worlds.

But her eyes had widened when she saw him. Beneath the veneer, ah, the Force had whispered _Caution!_.

And so he does no more when she leaves than offer her a small, half-flickered smile, willing his body to softness, to stillness, to acquiescence of what is sure to come. He has been trained since birth to welcome pain as a friend, however cruelly their acquaintance made.

She’s long, long gone, then, when the Human men make an offering of him to the Zabrak—their superior, no doubt, but under her command. There’s no mistaking the twisting of their faces or the bulges at their groins—one or two even begin to stroke themselves through crusted cloth that hasn’t seen a wash in months.

* * *

He didn’t realize that Zabrak males have spikes.

Not there.

Rough hands at his jaw, forcing it open, the spined engorged member proffered—almost gently—and he feels sickness mounting in his throat, feels the Force wrapping itself around him, quelling instinctive terror—oh, yes, well enough a Jedi will know pain and degradation. Well enough the Light will preserve him.

He stares into yellow eyes, into a war-torn face, and wills compassion to well from the center of his heart. Yes, this one has had a hard life—

spikes and all shoved scraping past his teeth and down his throat and he can’t _breathe_ and tears tear at his eyes and there’s more _and there’s more_ and he gags and it’s bitter and burns and as the male withdraws blood wells from the scratches and he can’t swallow it and

This one has suffered, too.

duracrete cold against his chest and cheek and someone’s knee in the small of his back and it’s Spiked One first and sweet Force it will tear him to pieces it will turn him inside out it burns _it burns_ and it’s the backstroke that tears at last a scream from him and someone wrenches up his head by the queue and the braid and the skin of his scalp and his eyes roll back and there aren’t spikes this time but it suffocates him and spills tepid viscous poison running down his throat

and down his throat

he can’t swallow it

not all of it

and running down his throat

and

_< It’s alright, it’s alright—hush now, it’s alright—Obi-Wan—>_

Metallic clatter, twice-wrought: tinkled bell and hollow tone. His stomach doubled up in knots, vomit bitter at his lips, splashed across his boots. He blinks. In another life he’d loved this soup. But it is white, and thick, and slides down his throat like—

A shudder seizes him; again he retches, violently, fighting for a breath that seems like it will never come.

“Obi-Wan, I’m here.”

Green-light— _the_ Light—the thing that had saved him—oh—the thing that tears at the darkness in his dreams—the man who had so gently washed him—the man who—

Not merely a man—

His Master—

Yes—

Hoarse-raw truth of it—

He pulls air into his lungs with a wrenching gasp, yes, violence, all is—

“Yes, Master—”

A cool cloth is pressed into his hands. He can’t stop shaking, shakes his head instead, and the cloth is pressed against his lips. Convulsively he swallows, tears streaming down his face, the body becoming less and less of him, a stranger’s thing, a thing of blood and excrement and cum and flesh and blood and

the flesh and blood betray

the flesh and blood—

* * *

She reeks of spice.

She comes, once, with the Spiked One and two guards with electrostaffs. Obi-Wan stands, every part of his body aching, masking the wince of pain behind that same half-crooked smile he’d given her however long ago. A day, a week, a lifetime. He doesn’t know. He’s called on the Force to slow down the machinations of his body; he has want of neither food nor drink—nor is he sure he could stomach it—and sleep will never come, though meditation leads him to the waters and the Light, the hope that borders on a promise, as much as a Jedi will grant such certainty.

Qui-Gon will come.

She walks around him once without a word. The air is charged, brighter than the dancing discharge of the staffs that buzz and whir, that whisper a hairsbreadth from his flesh as if in anticipation, as if they are an extension of the men who wield them—as all weapons ought to be.

Something’s different—something’s changed.

And then she steps closer, smiling, decaying teeth peeking out between chapped lips. Her eyes are red and the heat radiating from her body, the sweetness-stench of spice, are nearly overwhelming. She places her palms against his cheek, taking care to avoid the bruises there, tracing first the dried blood at his lips, then down his throat, tangling the smattered hair across his chest, burgeoning at last from pubescent peach-fuzz.

“You’ve done well with him,” she murmurs finally. “But watch me, sons—watch me and I will show you how to make a Jedi fall.”

* * *

Electrostaffs jabbed in his gut, a foot hooked behind his heel, duracrete cold at his back and the breath knocked from his lungs and the resounding crack of the back of his skull and the whole world seems to disappear, for however brief a moment, however slight a mercy.

Dazed, he can do nothing but stare up at the single, dirty light—before the shadow of her becomes the silhouette of flesh and blood and

Her lips are thick and crawl across his own and her tongue is caught between his teeth and it’s all raw squirming living flesh and he chokes and tries to move, to turn his head and fire explodes behind his eyes as electricity sears through him and he’s shaking and jerking and he can’t control

and flesh and blood betray and

his body responding to the friction, the sway of her grinding hips, the half-shucked patchwork fatigues that give glancing-rubbed snatches of skin against skin and he can feel _her_ , feel the heat of her, the hair-thatched folded wetness, as she rubs against his thigh and then, and even then, her breath is hoarse and fetid and harsh and

 _Please don’t please stop please don’t do this, please I’m_ begging _you, I don’t want this, I don’t want this, please, you don’t understand_

_I love him_

_Please_

He did not weep when Spiked One tore him to pieces. When the others had their say. When he woke to urine in his hair or a kick to the ribs to stir him from whatever moment of meditation he could manage. But he weeps now as blood rushes to his cock and it jumps into her hands, as she strokes him to hip-jerked hardness and watches him begin to tremble uncontrollably because he _can’t_ control it and there’s not a kriffing thing he can do to stop

_I don’t want I don’t want don’t please don’t please stop_

And her grip is firm and he’s never touched himself because nothing will be the touch of the man he loves and so he won’t defile

_please_

She sinks onto him, hot and slick, and he struggles again in vain: the electrostaffs searing and snaring at him, blow after blow until he is dazed and numb and sick and she moves and _she moves_ and smears herself against him and quivers and she’s pulsing-tight and

the flesh and blood betray

and wrenching sobs shatter and wrack him when

he is shattered

he can’t stop it

he can’t

“Master I’m so sorry please forgive me _please_ —”

Hands outheld, soft-broken-dawn, clear and brilliant and a room that’s small but the walls are stone and it’s gentle and he’s slept, he thinks: closed-eyed darkness, bright-eyed light, and there’s cloth beneath him and he’s shaking and his cock aches and there’s heat and his hips still judder with the spurted wetness and

Hands outheld, green-eternal-watered-Light: the energy that sings through him, oh, more known to him than his own, yes, clarion and crystal-clear and

“Obi-Wan, I’m here. I’m here. Peace, now. Hush now. Here I am. You’re safe. You’re safe.”

_But you don’t understand what she_

_What I_

_I didn’t want it please believe me please it’s_

_I_

_betrayed_

_Please_

_make it stop, make it go away_

_I love you_

_And she_

_I couldn’t help it_

_Please._

Familiar flesh beneath his hands, blood welling there beneath his fingernails and

Qui-Gon—warmth and Light and green and the waters of the Force—glaring sun and driving rain—and indomitable strength holding his hands, just his hands, with such agonizing tenderness and mercy that he can do no more harm to himself than to kick and flail and beg the Force for darkness, pouring unchecked-wild through the bond all that is, all that’s been, he cannot bear it, cannot stop it, no, while the body he can hardly call his own, the treacherous flesh ensnaring him, just screams and screams and screams.


	3. Chapter 3

There’s blood caked beneath his fingernails.

Bant hovers at the threshold to the small room the Healers have assigned to him: the walls are a pale, pale shade of muted green, like moss, and on a table in the corner flickers a Fire Crystal—one of the most potent healing tools they have. His face seems sharp-edged in the dancing glow, despite its boyishness; heavy shadows fall across his eyes and the Force ebbs around him in sluggish waves.

It’s been six months since Obi-Wan returned from the mission he dared not speak of, even to her, before he left. Six months and it took far less time indeed to realize that the young man, her dearest friend, isn’t really come back to them at all—not quite. The Obi-Wan who’d sat in the front row of classes, peppering the Masters with quips and questions and a cheeky grin but oh-so-kriffing- _serious . . ._ the Obi-Wan who’d had a dancer’s grace during lightsaber training . . . who’d sat beside her during their guided meditations and always, always, shared with her a bit of himself through the Force . . . some pale-blue light of his— _the_ Light— The Obi-Wan who’d almost never turned down second helpings in the mess hall or slipped her a sweet between classes . . .

Who’d told her, without words, in so many ways, how much he loved her. And how she’d known how it was meant.

That Obi-Wan is gone.

And now she meets the gaze of the young man huddled on the sleep-couch, confined to this sacrosanct space where the Healers sequester those who have some sickness of the mind . . . who are, so the whispers snare, toying with the Darkness. And with Obi-Wan, oh, she knows it isn’t true.

* * *

_Dawn broken with scudded clouds and warm-washed light flooding through the corridors. The Room of a Thousand Fountains is still, the soft water-whispers the only sound to break the silence as Bant steps from the largest pool—the pool where, once, she came so close to death—until Qui-Gon’s unmistakable low-lilting rumble startles her from thought._

_“Padawan Eerin—a moment, if I may.”_

_A hasty bow, taking care not to drip water on his boots. “Master Qui-Gon, sir.”_

_Gently he passes her her dry tunic and trousers, folded and waiting neatly on a stone; her webbed hands toy with the latch to her utility belt, the hilt of the lightsaber at her hip—finely-wrought silver, gleaming-bright. Something shifts in the Force, a hidden undercurrent, something well to be wary of—and at last Bant lifts her head, meeting Qui-Gon eye-to-eye._

_Something has . . . changed._

_More than once she watches him inhale, watches his lips twitch beneath the greying coarseness of his beard, as if he longs to speak and the words tangle at his tongue. His hands, as if for want of something, are folded, knuckles waxing white, wracked with visible tremors—violent, almost. The whole of him . . . trembles . . ._

_“I need your help._ He _needs your help.” A pause, a ducking of the head, that aquiline face shrouded for a moment by a mane of silvered-copper hair. “I . . . would like to ask for your help. For Obi-Wan.”_

_And there—the tumult within the Force that has left her on edge these many months—something she could not approach, dared not, no, not until this moment: if Obi-Wan wouldn’t ask for it, at least his Master . . ._

_“He’s struggling,” she murmurs finally, knowing with a sinking in her heart that it’s far, far more than that—anyone could see it, but oh, she’d hoped it wasn’t so. “He’s been since he got back . . . ”_

_“Yes—and more than that—he— He’s . . . with the Healers now. Last night something happened, and—” Qui-Gon catches himself, the words choked and tousled; he unclasps his shaking hands and for a moment buries his head, tearing splayed fingers through silvered tresses. Bant listens to him through the Force, to the flares of his energy at once bright and spindled and chaotic and . . . broken. As if his whole world has been shattered but oh, but oh, it_ can’t _be, because—_

_His Padawan means everything to him._

_Who watches after Qui-Gon, now?_

_Obi-Wan, it used to be—Obi-Wan, it always was—_

_“I don’t know what to do.” The cracked admittance, the shuddering breath, the indigo eyes at last alit upon her own, the proud face pale and anguish-struck. “Please, Bant—I know how much you mean to him. I’m sorry to ask this of you but I know he—”_

Loves _, the word unspoken: needs not be said: can never be: would be far, far less than it is if struck to profanity and given sound. Bant feels her gills painfully contract, blinks salt water from her silver eyes. The word that, between the three of them, has caused so much sorrow and could bring so much abounding joy—_

 _For what is. For what can never be. For the currents running sometimes-dark and deep and more often than not they’re so terribly_ bright.

_There are many ways to love._

_Impulsively she reaches out, grasping one of Qui-Gon’s massive hands in both her own, just as she does with Obi-Wan. To tilt her head enough to meet his gaze is to let gravity coax down tears at the cusp of spilling over and to see that Qui-Gon, too, is weeping. Her quiet voice carries the sound of many waters when at length she speaks again._

_“We’ll help him together, then.”_

* * *

There’s blood caked beneath his fingernails.

Obi-Wan holds her hand, tracing the motley textures—the webbing, the fine digits, the cartilage, the suckers at her palms. The hands of hers that bear no scars because no one could ever stand to land a strike against her—not even as a youngling, when the training sabers did no more than burn. Bant sits awkwardly at the edge of the sleep-couch, uncertain how to speak with him, how to behave around him. As her friend—the young man who’s been gone these six long months? As a stranger? Surely not . . .

And for a long moment, then, they sit without speaking: some modicum of peace begins to lay itself across his face, the shadowed eyes to grow less hazed, the tension to ease from his brow and clenched jaw. She dares not consider whose blood it is under his nails, though from Qui-Gon’s plea this morning, she wonders if it’s Obi-Wan’s.

At last he shifts, gaze flicking up for a brief moment to meet her own before dropping to her hands.

“I thought of you. Your silver eyes."

He speaks softly, without inflection, as if he doesn’t trust himself with words or voice, as if they belong to someone else entirely . . . and something tangles in Bant’s heart. For all she’s considered that this young man isn’t Obi-Wan . . .

Of course he is.

What’s part of what Master Qui-Gon meant—why he asked for help—

Because Obi-Wan’s still there. Somewhere. Forever changed, but . . . Obi-Wan. Forever and always.

And the silence stretches, sharpens, becomes brittle and Bant wishes she knew what to say. Wishes she knew what had happened—for a Jedi is no stranger to suffering, to pain: surely these things, not alone, could have left him in such a state. He’s survived far worse. She wishes, too, that Qui-Gon were here. The grip on her hand tightens, almost painfully so, but she dares not draw away.

“I’ve missed you,” she whispers finally. “I was so worried.”

A choked sound—a thread of mirthless laughter bitten off and forced back down again because their friendship is too precious to waste on such ugliness. “I wish I hadn’t come back.”

“What—”

“No—it’s not—I don’t—” Pursed-pale lips and the eyes are dark again and he seems to have difficulty swallowing. “But sometimes I wish I . . . Bant . . . I can’t tell anyone . . . they won’t understand . . . How can I? Can they?”

“Not even Master Qui-Gon?”

Sharp, spasmodic shake of the head: the legs drawn up, the shoulders curled in, shivers wracking him, clutching her hand to his chest; she can feel the shaking exhalations of his breath, drawn too quickly, oh, and the same grief-anger-sorrow as had all but consumed his Master comes now for him, too. But differently—oh—and the Force whispers _Caution . . ._

“I can't ever tell him,” Obi-Wan begins at last, torrential words torn between clenched teeth, spat like poison, dredged up from a darkness that even the Fire Crystal cannot penetrate and always, always in that terrible monotone, that hollow-cracked bell, that voice of nothing but a ghost . . . 

“And I _thought_ ”—dry-wracked sobs and shivering grown to visible shaking, grown to the body rocking back and forth in time with the words he can’t seem to bear to speak, grown to the pulse pounding a thread-quick time at his throat—”I thought the pain didn't matter because we are, that’s what we _are,_ what we’re trained to do, it doesn’t matter, crude matter, Bant, don’t you understand? And there were spikes and—I thought I could—"

 _But the pain_ does _matter,_ Bant realizes grimly, the pieces falling into place with rapid-fire certitude. _This kind of pain—it does. This isn't something you can heal from like a blaster-bolt or broken bone . . . it's not a scar to add to a life hard-lived . . . We're trained to endure suffering but_ this _—_

Gasped-wrenching breath, the words quickening and low-strung in a hoarse-edged whisper—violent, reckless—what the Obi-Wan she's known would never say, not so openly, not here, not with the Healers who might overhear or—

But it doesn't matter—

There's blood caked beneath his fingernails—

“And then she . . . and I couldn’t help it and it was just for Qui-Gon and I wanted it with him and only him and there were spikes and she stole it from me and I couldn't help it and it burned and the spikes made me swallow it the men made me swallow it and and spikes tore me to pieces and she wouldn't stop she wouldn't stop—Bant, _I couldn't help it_!"

_The one thing, sacred—your love for Qui-Gon—oh, my friend, my dearest—_

_What can I do to help? Please, please, let me help—let_ us _—_

Bant reaches for the center of herself, for the Force, for all the Light and the gentlest waters and oh, would that she could pour them over him, open the curtains to let the warmth in; would that she could take away this agony and

just know what to say—

_It's not your fault. It's not your fault. It's not your fault._

A broken sound, an animal’s cry, and he half-crawls to close the meager gap between them, crawls into her arms, oh, and she doesn’t know what to do except hold him as he can’t stop shaking and his hands wander and tangle with the cartilage and carapaces of her body, as if clinging for dear life.


	4. Chapter 4

“Do you know where you are?”

The litany begun again. The questions softly-slipped, slurred, almost: whispered in a voice that rumbles like an avalanche or shifts as song, as swelling waves.

cold room duracrete walls floor ceiling just a light in the ceiling dirty light sickly yellow and Spiked One’s eyes are yellow and

“Do you know where you are?”

He blinks, forces himself to focus on the hands holding his own, one each: salmon skin, the taste of salt if he were to press it against his lips—callouses, familiar threads of copper hair, fine-gleaming in the predawn gathered light: strong and sure and beautiful, _that_ light. The walls are warm and smooth and they hold the light as if a friend. The duracrete had spat it back as if it were poison.

“I’m in the Temple . . . “

and Spiked One’s eyes are yellow and he’s watching her as she

and she smiles as his hips buck into her touch and when she kisses him her tongue tastes the tears he can’t keep from sliding down his face and he can’t help it and he shrinks away away _away_ and pain explodes behind his eyes and she’s hot and wet and tight and she rocks with deliberate wanton lust and she moves and she _moves_ and won’t stop and it’s agony and he can feel it like the vomit rising in his throat he can’t stop it he can’t and light and light and _light_

And Light.

Pouring over him. Silver waters. Life-green light.

The suckers on Bant’s palms. The pulse through Qui-Gon’s veins that finds echo through the bond—the one sacred thing that they could _never_ touch—

However much he’s polluted all the rest of it. Even that. Even the thing his Master could never know—

His body trembles, sickness sharp at his throat, rigid as a stone, willing the ache to go away. Spurted heat when he awoke from the nightmare, sharp-short jerking of his hips, the rest of him wrapped in Bant’s arms because she keeps some of the dreams at bay and reminds him of nothing of what was done to him, she’s a Mon Calamari after all and so _unlike_ them all, and still it wants and _wants_ and it was profane, always, but at least a bittersweet profanity he knew well and understood and still carried with him, still loved, would _always_ love, the both of them, and then—

“Just breathe. Just breathe. We’re both here. You’re safe . . . ”

he will die it will devour him it’s sharp and hot and pulsing-bright and

he’d held his breath

and holds his breath

and the choked-gasping breath’s torn from his lungs at last and through blurred eyes he sees blue and silver and

the flesh and blood betray

_< It will go away, my Padawan. It will not hurt you, that I promise . . . Breathe . . . >_

The rhythm strung through the bond, soft and sure and _right_ , as only and ever Qui-Gon can be. Obi-Wan forces himself to inhale, shuddering, caught on the phantom gashes down his throat that have long since healed, over and over again: the swaying of the ocean, the dancing of the light: inhale and taste the salt of Bant’s skin; exhale and feel the squeeze of Qui-Gon’s hand and the rhythm kept and again, and again, and again . . .

* * *

Little by little, he comes back to them.

Qui-Gon feels it first, slowly, in meditation: the pale blue light, the broken dawn, creeping across the distance he’s kept purposefully between them—distance but never _distant_ —because the same fear as first haunted him aboard the shuttle spun through screaming stars to Coruscant remains. He moves slowly, speaks softly, asks questions before everything.

With tentative, shivering surety, his Padawan reaches from the shadows.

_< Please see me. Please find me. I’m here.>_

Bant sees it when Obi-Wan can meet the gazes of the Zabrak males and Humans—male and female both—that they encounter during studies or training or at meals. Or when Siri Tachi brushes past him with no uncertainties, an _obscene_ thing, the swell of her breast beneath her tunic pressed against his shoulder—and for a moment he is blank, the eyes unfocused, his body still and tense—before Bant’s at his side and he offers her a quiet smile, a shake of his head, even as she stares daggers at Siri’s retreating back.

* * *

Little by little, he comes back to himself.

The world that had become a blur begins to focus: the mornings to mean softness, to mean light, to mean Bant’s arms and even if it means (often) that the . . . that he wakes to stiffness . . . it isn’t all bad. The air against his skin. The familiar rough fabric of his robe. Meditations to set him aright—he always feels whole and clean when he’s done bathing in the Light.

The soup he used to love becomes just that, again: just thick white soup, though he doesn’t love it so much anymore.

He can clean himself and at last be _conscious_ of his body: can run his hands through the thatch of hair and pull the foreskin back and cup his scrotum and wash the cleft. The places that were defiled. The places that so long revolted him, that seemed as if they belonged to a stranger. He looks, sometimes, and sees the scars, and yes, thinks they were as good as clawed by another’s hand. Not his.

Perhaps, in a way, it’s so.

* * *

But there are moments, too, when a touch or a glance or a shadow or a sound or a taste or scent or a dream will throw him into darkness. When days pass and he doesn’t sleep and time itself loses meaning and he is a prisoner in his own flesh and mind, numb, distant, stricken from reality, stripped of all that is and whittled down to nothing, nothing, _nothing_ but the things done to his body that haunt him: phantom touches, phantom faces, and not even Qui-Gon’s soothing voice borne along the bond can convince him that he’s safe—it isn’t real. Not anymore.

* * *

The hilt feels alive beneath his hand: the morning’s broken and it’s been blurred months turned to a restive year of nothing but the Temple and the Healers and Master Yoda guiding him through special meditations, Bant’s silver eyes and reaching often for his Master’s hands. Qui-Gon’s at last returned his lightsaber—with the power cell removed. For now.

There’s no reason he can’t practice his _katas_ with his Master, after all—for the blade itself is weightless.

And the Force, oh, the glorious Light, the waters, green-silver-broken-dawn-blue, they flow through his body and blood and his bones and his veins and every fibre of his being and the hilt and the blade-that-would-be and Qui-Gon’s own verdant saber and they move in unison and for a time, for just a time, become as if two beings become one, the bond bursting with song and tremulous rapture and this, yes, this is as it should be, always.

* * *

Qui-Gon struggles not to pull a grimace. He forgot that Kit Fisto likes his tea both cold and strong.

The Nautolan Master appraises him with wide, dark eyes, like polished stones, like the shimmering primordial dark. His normally jovial face bears a certain, undefinable sadness to it, his head-tendrils despondent and still.

“Have I done enough?” Qui-Gon asks at last, curling the question around another gulp of tea. “Have I done what’s _right_?”

“Who knows what’s right in situations such as this? Force knows none of us would ever wish to test it for ourselves. Ah—tell me, then, Qui-Gon: tell me what you’ve done for him.”

Qui-Gon cards a hand through his hair a moment, spitting the words at last like the bitter leaves stuck to his tongue. “Washed him on the shuttle back—brought him to the Healers for what was more than I could do—but Kit, the way he _looked_ at me . . . the way he reacted to them . . . I stood in the doorway and watched and I told myself that it was to make sure nothing happened, but I . . . I felt like I somehow . . . ”

“Hurt him, too? Do you really look at yourself and see that?”

“I should never have let him go on the mission.”

“Could you have countermanded the Council? Many times you’ve done so before but for a cause such as this—would they listen to you? On what grounds would you say he wasn’t ready?”

“ _But it’s my fault._ ”

“Is not.” A wry smile quirked at Kit’s lips, head-tendrils shivering slightly. “Your helplessness has morphed into a feeling that, by the very acts wrought upon him . . . it must be your fault. And here I thought you’d learned from Xanatos, my friend—we give all of ourselves to our Padawans, and they give all of themselves in return. But there are forces in the galaxy far greater than our own, including the actions of others—our Padawans amongst them. And no matter how much good we wish upon them, how much we try to instill our wisdom unto them . . . They are always their own beings. As are all we meet. We can never control what happens to them, Qui-Gon, no matter our intentions—nor should we try. Any Jedi should remember this. A crècheling does.”

Qui-Gon offers no more than a shrug and a hollow “Hm,” draining the cup of tea, leaves and all, welcoming the acrid dregs.

“You’ll certainly do him no good if you blame yourself. He needs you. More than ever, now.”

“The Council has decided, then?”

“Of course. It’s been a year. Bant and I need to get away from the Temple.” Kit pauses a moment, stroking a tendril idly, before adding, “They kept us here for you, you know. For him. Think what you might of the Council, but they were not blind to his suffering—or to what the Force must will for him. His strength . . . and yours. It’s part of why they haven’t reassigned you both to a new mission yet, either . . . or . . . “

 _Reassigned him, period._ Some Jedi Knights came back from wars or wounds or prison cells or tortures unspeakable and were broken beyond mending. Qui-Gon knows this. Knows, too, that they are either secreted away, into quiet rooms and solitude, or reassigned to one of the ancillary Corps. Always a Jedi—but never more a Knight.

* * *

He holds her hand in a white-knuckled grip, has done since she told him, has done all the way from the Room of a Thousand Fountains to the landing pad where she and Master Kit will board a shuttle, bound for an orbital station. Beyond that—passage to a far and forlorn world.

A whisper through the Force, green-light, soft-familiar, reaching for him, wrapping around him even as Qui-Gon’s hand settles on his shoulder. The depths, the private knowledge, of how much this moment costs him. The promise that he will not walk alone.

Master Kit comes with a fieldpack slung across his back; a touch in kind to Bant’s shoulder and the Mon Calamari follows in his wake, casting a final glance over her shoulder: one wide, silver-rimmed gleaming eye meeting Obi-Wan’s, the hint of a most tender smile at her lips.

* * *

Qui-Gon wakes to the cry, the harsh-wrought gasping indrawn breath he’s come to know so well: Obi-Wan’s body wrested from a nightmare. He listens, for a moment, to the silence: the silence that’s more awful than any whimper or sob: the silence that reminds him so terribly much of the void in the bond, the silence in the Force, that had been his Padawan what seems like a lifetime ago—and no more than a day.

It occurs to him, as he pours out warmth and Light and open hands and willing heart, that Obi-Wan’s isn’t the only mind—nor his the only body—which can’t let go of what’s been done.

What Kit said over bitter tea—

_< Obi-Wan. I’m here. You’re safe. Nothing can hurt you. Nothing can harm you or touch you or cause you pain. It’s me, it’s only me. I’m here, my Padawan—>_

* * *

_< I’m here.>_

Obi-Wan closes his eyes a moment, fishing through the darkness for the brightest Light, the soft-green warmth, the bond wide and deep, strong as an embrace. Bant is gone. His sleep-couch is empty and he wasn’t prepared for just how much he’d miss her _nearness_ : the carapaces and cartilage cradled in his arms and how she smelled, always, like salt and soft waves . . .

It’s not even that she kept the nightmares entirely at bay—for what woke him now is not a nightmare of what has been.

But what will be.

The Force has offered a glimpse of the future, however brief, and however uncertain still, it twists his heart: Bant dead in the same pool where she’d nearly died before, blood muddying the waters, her silver eyes sunken, dull.

But worse—

(How can he so quantify—?)

But _worse_ , a crimson blade and a male Zabrak with yellow eyes and Qui-Gon falls—

Is it selfish, to think that so much has been stolen from him—and to think, why more, why this? Why the man he loves? Or his dearest friend?

A Jedi should not love. A Jedi should have no attachments, should . . . have no such possessive emotions . . . A Jedi gives without end: mercy, compassion, love for all beings but never can a Jedi ask for such love, or such mercy or compassion in kind . . .

_< Padawan.>_

And for a moment, just a moment, he is more afraid of the future than the past: of what hasn’t been, might-not-yet-be, than spikes or heat or grasping hands or—

On soundless feet he slips across the room, knowing nothing but what Qui-Gon offers— _presence_ , sheer embodied warmth and comfort and closeness—

The man he used to be would have shook his head and wrapped himself in his robe and shivered, wide-eyed, until the dawn. Alone. Maybe, once, it should have been that way. But now . . .

Too much is shattered, is changed. He doesn’t know where all this falls within the Code. Or how close Bant and Qui-Gon have both come in breaking it to help him. But he’d be lost without them, utterly lost: the Darkness would have won, would have consumed him . . . He’d have worse than self-wrought scars that still ache, sometimes, though he knows it’s only memory.

_< Master.>_

He slips into Qui-Gon’s arms, not knowing if he wants to hold or be held, not knowing if it’s right—or wrong—but knowing simply that the broad, strong hands of the man who'd washed away the blood and crusted cum and _her_ now cradle his—that the body so much taller and broader than his own, a complex tapestry of hard muscle and yielding flesh—this great mountain of a man—embraces him with such exquisite tenderness . . .

Such love.

He considers that a year go, even Qui-Gon's touch was more than he could bear. Was dangerous. He considers that his own bodily reactions, his own mind, had all betrayed him—all beyond his grasp, beyond his training, beyond the Code. Beyond even the Force, or so it felt at times. His throat tautens and he wonders how to ask forgiveness.

Instead he cards his hands through Qui-Gon’s hair. For the first time since he can remember, he knows beyond doubt that he has all the pieces, here and now, of the man he used to be. Some are shattered, still—broken beyond recognition—but here they are, the whole of them. Once whole they were, he was, and someday—


	5. Chapter 5

“Awake, you should be!”

Qui-Gon lets the Coruscanti sunlight filter through his eyelids, warm and thick; Obi-Wan’s cheek is pressed against his own, the weight of the younger man solid and heavy and _real_ in a way that the Jedi can’t quite believe—though guilt isn’t far behind the disbelief. For why it is . . .

Sleep was a long time in coming; something had lodged in Obi-Wan’s mind, something he dared not speak of, for which he had no words, something that had set him mute and still and glassy-eyed, such as he hasn’t been for months . . . but at last, at last, the Force slipped through the cracks, through the walls, through the Darkness, and Obi-Wan had curled up in his arms, shivering—but had followed him in meditation, one used mostly for restless crèchelings—and, at last, had—

“Need more sleep, you do not!”

A sharp prod with something blunt. Qui-Gon considers this a moment, searching through the Force, finding nothing except Obi-Wan’s presence, that dawn-struck blue, so pale and fragile and—

The voice.

_Surely . . . not._

_Surely._

And the blunt prod becomes a smart rap across the shins, enough to fling Qui-Gon to his feet—and Obi-Wan, reflexively, the same—the both of them hastily wrapping their disheveled robes about their nakedness. The bond flares bright and uncertain—their position was . . . unorthodox . . . to say the least . . . and the lenience granted Obi-Wan for the past year has been unorthodox enough.

Their gazes are drawn, at last, as if by inexorable gravitation, towards the form of the ancient Grand Master.

“A meeting with the Council, you have. Summoned you, we did. Forgotten, have you, Master Qui-Gon?”

The most the older man can manage is an awkward bow, attempted dignity. “No, Master.”

“It’s my fault, Master Yoda.” Obi-Wan self-consciously tucks his half-tangled braid behind his ear, an almost delicate gesture. He bites off whatever had risen to his tongue, uncertain; Qui-Gon glances at him—a flickering of indigo eyes, no more. Something twinges across the bond, mutual guilt, mutual discomfort. The dichotomy that what they do, they know, is wrong—though innocent—no one could accuse them of aught but that—but, oh, but still, but _wrong_.

A Jedi should have no attachments . . . A Jedi should feel no such love. For all. Not for one.

Not like this . . .

“ _Your_ fault, is it? Hm. Good sleep, needs a growing Padawan. Done growing, you are not. Much to learn, you both still have.” A moment’s pause, and then the wrinkled face deepens with a smile not unkind. “Many hours’ sleep, _I_ get. Also a Padawan, I am—a student always, of the living Force.” The gimer-stick is clunked once against the smooth stone floor. “Come, come. Missed meditation and your _katas_ , you have--time for food, it is.”

“But the Council’s summons?” Qui-Gon casts the venerable Master a final glance, gathering his tunic and trousers.

One large, wise eye meets Obi-Wan’s, the smile broadened—and for a brief moment, Yoda seems almost like a youngling, deep in mock conspiracy. “Good food also needs a growing Padawan, hm?”

* * *

_< There is no emotion; there is peace . . . >_

_< Center yourself in the here-and-now, young Padawan.> _Qui-Gon’s hand is warm at his shoulder—a surprising thing, the gesture, given how Master Yoda found them not an hour before. But the corridors are deserted, the turbolift up to the Council’s chamber empty. For a moment, just a moment more, they have . . . this. And they have their mutual uncertainty, their fear, spooling itself along the bond despite Qui-Gon’s attempts at reassurance.

_< Master Yoda is not unfair. If he had seen fault with our actions, he would have spoken of it . . . not called us to breakfast.>_

_< Yes, Master.> _Obi-Wan worries at his lip, wishing the turbolift might move more slowly. _< Do you know why the Council wants to see us?>_

 _< Do _you _? >_

Of course he does. He thinks. It’s been a year. Bant and Master Kit have been sent off on a mission. How long, really, could he expect the Council to accommodate his . . . lapse? _Healing_ , he’s heard whispered—or _recovery_. But neither word seems right. He knows that not all Jedi come back whole from missions, nor do all come back whole in time. But a _year_ . . . he cannot help but look back on the year with shame. A Jedi would not struggle so . . . Would not cling to his best friend, let alone his Master, because he’s scared to sleep alone, and find that no amount of meditation soothes the fear. The Darkness knows each and every crack . . .

_< Obi-Wan.>_

Tenderly, the tug on his braid, long enough now to wrap twice around his Master’s hand. And that, ever, always, is Qui-Gon: his anchor, keeping him from spiraling loose into

nothing

_< Whatever happens, Obi-Wan, I’m here.>_

In a moment, then, bright as lightning, as a thousand suns, the promise, the truth, all that Qui-Gon would give or do for him: each and all between—

The tremor in the hand that grasps his braid. The little hidden truth they dare not speak, wrapped in all that is forbidden—in the Code, their vows—wrapped, too, in what’s been done: wrapped in all the words whispered ’round what the past year has been.

—leaving the Order, and laying down his life, and learning to love—for the first, for the last, and again.

* * *

The Council chamber is awash in the Coruscanti sun, blazing through the transparisteel windows, floor-to-ceiling, a burst of heat and light, glancing off the polished floor. Obi-Wan is surprised to see so many empty seats—and terribly relieved. Masters Yoda, Mace Windu and Ki-Adi Mundi . . .

In unison, they bow.

“Welcome, Master Qui-Gon, Padawan Kenobi.” Mace steeples his fingers, appraises the both of them from unreadable dark eyes. “I will dispense with the formalities. We have called you here because we are concerned about your . . . progress.”

“In what way?” Qui-Gon’s tone is deceptively light: Obi-Wan can hear the threads of durasteel shot through, can feel the bond tauten—and not for the first time is reminded of Qui-Gon's ability to embody gale as well as mountain.

“It’s been a year since you’ve taken a mission. In fact, you’ve turned down every one we’ve offered you.”

Obi-Wan tilts his head, almost imperceptibly; Qui-Gon _stayed_ —for him?

“Because my duty was—and is—to remain with my Padawan. I will not abandon him, not for a mission for which so many others are more suited.” Qui-Gon ducks his head a moment, considering his words; Obi-Wan watches as he shifts, slightly, a subtle play in how he carries the center of his weight. “Not even for a mission which . . . No. My place is here. With him. Until he is ready.”

“And when do you think that will be?” Ki-Adi’s voice is soft, as ever: lilting, delicate: there is no challenge, no hidden motive.

“That’s Obi-Wan’s decision—not mine.”

Mace makes as if to object, not the least for the sheer ambiguity, but Ki-Adi quietly lifts his hand, forestalling any argument. “As is appropriate, to some extent, given the circumstances. Padawan Kenobi?”

Obi-Wan glances at his Master, hoping to find some answer in the sun-cast silhouette, the bond, the Force—anything. Anything but the very act which should be second-nature to all Jedi—anything but looking within himself and searching for the answer. The truth is . . . he doesn’t know. He closes his eyes, sifting through the sacred waters, through the Light, holding the pieces in his hands that he can’t reassemble. Nor is he sure what to make with them, anew. They are glittering sharp and bright: alluring and dangerous. He’s sure he’ll pull his hands away bloody if he handles them too roughly.

But he can’t stare at them forever and watch how they refract the Light and do nothing.

“I don’t know, Master.”

“Apathy is death.” Mace draws the words carefully; they send a shiver up Obi-Wan’s spine; he can see Qui-Gon shaken by them, too. Legend says they were spoken by a Fallen Jedi—one who learned the ways of the Sith and betrayed them, too, in turn—

“And this isn’t apathy.” Glaring-bright, the durasteel: Qui-Gon’s dropped all pretenses of poise. “This is—”

“‘ _Healing_ ’?” Windu challenges. “Is it?”

“Learn anything, Padawan Kenobi will, by staying in the Temple, hm?” Master Yoda traces his claws along his gimer-stick. “Think that, do you, Master Qui-Gon?”

“He cannot hide forever,” Ki-Adi adds.

The bond bristles, the energy heightened in a way that Obi-Wan knows will do neither himself nor his Master any favors. Yoda’s eyes meet his, meet Qui-Gon’s—the ancient being well aware of the line that Qui-Gon very soon might cross. One that would mean far worse than any fate in store for Obi-Wan—

_< There is no emotion, there is peace, Master.>_

A wry twitching of the lips: half a fleeting smile, gone.

“And besides . . . “ Mace pauses, offering a shrug that, for all its deference, isn’t ruthless, without empathy. “Obi-Wan is neither the first nor the last.”

“They why don’t you have more—”

“Master!” Obi-Wan grabs Qui-Gon’s arm impulsively, drops it in an instant, beseeching through the bond for peace, for stillness, for silence. For once, for Qui-Gon to acquiesce to the will of the Council. To see the truth in their words. “They’re not wrong. I cannot . . . stay here . . . forever. The whole of the Temple is not the galaxy. A Jedi is selfless, serving others, _living_ for others. Who do I live for but myself if I . . . stay? And do nothing? I’d have no right to call myself a Jedi then.”

_< It’s not that simple, Padawan—>_

Flashed between them, images, sensations, faster than thought, in the blink of an eye: the warmth and solidity of Obi-Wan’s body in Qui-Gon’s arms; the quiet triumph at their closeness, the rekindled trust, the fact that it’s his Master, now, to whom he turns when the memories threaten to draw him back down into the darkness. Not that he'd ever held it against Bant . . . but to have Obi-Wan forever distant from him, to have that trust shattered, would have broken Qui-Gon's heart.

And, too . . . the all-consuming guilt . . . the fear . . . that as the year’s gone on, Qui-Gon begins again to see his Padawan as beautiful. Before the mission gone so wrong, oh, he’d—

The attractions he’d buried for the sake of _everything—_ for what place have the pleasures of the flesh after such defilement?—have slowly come back to him, in time . . . ones on which he’d never act, of course—but oh—would that he never _felt_ them to begin with—

And _that_ , in part, is why the draw to keep him here. To keep them both here. To hide.

Because what can they possibly hope to return to? Their bond as it was? The galaxy as it was? What Qui-Gon had hoped for, someday—that Obi-Wan might come to see the grey area of the Code, at least in this, in love, and—?

All this—all this _here_ and _now_. As if Qui-Gon is a mirror unto which he looks and sees . . . himself . . . because isn’t what’s found therein something he’s considered, too? In all the brokenness—perhaps made all the worse—his attraction to Qui-Gon has never been still? All the difference, then—but really not so different after all—is what she stole from _him_. The bodily expression of the pleasure.

Obi-Wan sways where he stands.

All this, in the blink of an eye.

The sharp rap of Yoda’s gimer-stick against the stone—and the implicit truth that he will find them, always.

“To Dantooine, we send you. Ruthless, mercenaries have become, and arrogant. Rumors, we hear, of illegal trades. Investigate these, you will.”

“We’re only looking for information at this point.” Mace settles back in his chair, visibly at ease, as if grateful for something to hold onto rather than facing the indignation of Qui-Gon Jinn. “To confirm or dispel the rumors. Do not engage anyone. This is not a conflict to be solved on a single world with a lightsaber.”

Something like a warm smile passes across Ki-Adi Mundi’s face. “You’ll go together, of course.” Almost as an afterthought, in undertones: “We’re not so cruel as that.”

“Although we _will_ continue to monitor your progress. Both of you. You’re not officially called up on probation, but we do have . . . reservations. Taking time to recover from a mission, even one gone terribly wrong, is appropriate. To take a year and do nothing is not.”

“You say he’s done _nothing_?” Qui-Gon all but spits the words, taking a step towards the Master, who does no more than raise an eyebrow, as if satisfied that the former is making his own private misgivings apparent. “Or _I’ve_ done nothing? What could you _possibly_ know about—”

Mace stands, rearranging his robe with an air of detached nonchalance, sweeping past Qui-Gon without ceremony. “This mission, and all that follow it, begin the process of rebuilding our trust. I regret only that we have not addressed this situation sooner.”

Ki-Adi touches their shoulders, briefly, both of them—an unspoken apology—before following Mace from the room, leaving Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan utterly bewildered in their wake.

Master Yoda holds up a hand, twisted as the branches of a tree, to stay their leaving, too. He seems, suddenly, in the empty Council chamber, every one of his hundreds of years—and if not weary, worldly-wise.

“Come,” he intones at last. “And sit.”

* * *

Obi-Wan blinks, and the sun is dying. As he gathers himself from the trance his body at last begins to protest its long sojourn on the cool-stone floor. For all his grace, there is a stiffness to Qui-Gon’s movements when he stands. Yoda, half-hidden by the shadows now, offers them nothing for a long moment. Indeed, he’d said nothing during meditation, only guided them _deep_ , where the Light was pure and warm, where the whole of them was stripped away and it was as if to gaze upon each other’s spirit.

“This morning, how I found you . . . Close, you have become.” He leans back, closing his eyes, breathing a graveled sigh. “Once I saw a young man, angry, and a Jedi, broken. Years and training—healed both such wounds, they have. But now the opposite, I see. A broken young man and a Jedi, angry. Blinded by emotion. Heal this too, time and training will.”

“Forgive me for my outbursts earlier, Master.” Qui-Gon kneels with his head bowed, shoulders hunched, hair falling about his face unchecked. “They were . . . inappropriate. And I have come to see that my feelings for my Padawan are likewise—”

_< Master, I don’t think that’s what—>_

But even as the words tumble through the bond, Obi-Wan regathers the point he'd been so acutely self-conscious of this morning. No Jedi should . . . feel . . . so deeply. Not for another. Not this way.

A shake of Yoda’s head, a cautionary claw upheld. “Pass judgement too quickly, I think you do. Much fear in you I sense, Master Qui-Gon—and worse than the fear of your apprentice. Pass in time, _that_ will. Much progress have I seen, in the meditations Obi-Wan and I have shared. A proper teacher, you must be—as you have once before become.”

Soft, a touch—not unlike the bond—sure and swift and gentle; indescribably _vast_. The presence of Yoda through the Force is . . . Obi-Wan leans back his head a moment, cupping his hands where they rest against his thighs. Like a smooth stone . . . like moss . . . As if he has seen the beginning and will see the end and will see the birth, anew, for in the Force there is no death.

The bond shivers; Obi-Wan glances over to find, by the vermilion glow, tears upon his Master’s cheeks.

“Know the Code, you must. Know your heart, you must. A Jedi must know _why_ he acts—both in service to another and for whom, for what, he gives himself away. In sacrifice, all is. Balance, there _must_ be. Withheld or offered, something _always_ is.”


	6. Chapter 6

Qui-Gon hasn’t said a word since they left the Council chambers. Dusk is beginning to creep over Coruscant, purpled shadows and lavender quietude that even the gaudy glare of the city’s neon lights can’t entirely snuff out. Obi-Wan worries at the bond as he sets to packing his gear, offering less than questions, less than paltry whispers of emotion. He doesn’t know what to say, or how to bridge the chasm that’s yawned so inexplicably between them. It's as if Qui-Gon's become a stranger in the course of less than a day . . . This, the same man who'd held him, who'd all but _sung_ the meditation used to put little crèchelings to sleep?

At last his hand falls to his hip, to the hilt of his lightsaber—missing, still, the power cell.

“Master.”

The bond will get him nowhere, now—it seems Master Yoda’s words have driven Qui-Gon somewhere distant, so far within himself that—

Ah.

Different, of course— _far_ different—but Obi-Wan knows the trick too well.

 _Don’t look at me,_ say every line of Qui-Gon’s body. _Don’t see me. No—leave me alone._

“Master, I will need a working lightsaber, if only for defense. You can’t protect us both.”

“You’ve never been proficient at Soresu.”

Obi-Wan purses his lips a moment, releasing the instinctive flare of anger into the waters, into the Light, knowing that the uncharacteristic quip isn’t really meant for _him_ , nor the emotions that birthed it. And, perhaps, someday, he’ll—

“You still have my power cell.”

A grunt, no more—and Qui-Gon rummages in his footlocker, tosses Obi-Wan the part without ceremony. “Be quick.”

Obi-Wan turns the familiar part over in his hand; the technology is cold, so unlike the crystal found on Ilum—but no less necessary. No less a part of the living blade, the blade that seems as much his own flesh and blood. Wearily he unhooks the hilt from his belt, settling himself on his sleep-couch, slipping without another word, for the second time that day, into a trance—willing the pieces to unravel.

* * *

Qui-Gon spares his Padawan a sidelong glance as the will-directed Force slides the last component into place. Obi-Wan rises to his feet, experimentally thumbing the activation switch, his face so briefly awash in familiar blue phosphorescence—the hum seeping to the marrow of the Master’s bones—

Briefly he sees the young man in the caves on Ilum, meditating for days over the components, the profundity of what lay at stake in the moment heavy on his hunched shoulders. But his face, oh, when he’d emerged at last from the trance and offered his Master his blade for inspection—the joy in his eyes—not at his work but the will of the Force, and his own, as one, in tandem—

The hilt that looks so much like his own . . .

And Obi-Wan, for all those months slipping from the garb of a Jedi, weaponless, to at the very least sow some shred of _goodness_ on a world torn to shreds with war—if he could sow no peace—

If he hadn’t taken his mission so seriously—if he’d but had his lightsaber—if Qui-Gon hadn’t insisted on the Council’s mandate, that Obi-Wan leave it behind—to test him, so they said—

No, far more than that—

If Qui-Gon hadn’t let him go—alone—at all—

What kind of Master would he be?

What kind of Master is he _now_?

Kit’s words over cold tea, in this moment, mean nothing. Not in the shadow of what Mace Windu’s said. Because _that_ , at least for now, seems far more the truth, and the blame is all too easy to hold closer to his heart than mercy.

* * *

The shuttle’s prepped faster than Obi-Wan’s ever seen, as if Qui-Gon is desperate to leave. There’s no other word for it than that—not with the harried look in his Master’s eyes, nor his silence, nor the few rough commands he gives when absolutely necessary.

He considers the reasons why as his hands dance over the controls, blissfully familiar: except for picking apart the atmospheric controller’s chatter in his ear over the headset, he need not think too much. He suspects a large part of it is that Qui-Gon likes to have situations within his control—or at least his understanding. What’s been done . . . what’s _been_ . . . has been, shy of mortal wound or death, as far a cry as one could get from anything that could possibly fall within his understanding or control.

The past year, too, in its own savage way, has been reprieve from that which Master and Padawan had been dancing around for many years before: not merely the time and training that had fostered between them mutual respect, had bound them together within the Force more tightly than any tie of flesh and blood or what other beings know as _love_ —

But just that. But love.

And the piqued-curious flesh that slips through vows and discipline and Code.

Something, now, that seems . . . distorted. Something that he can’t quite look at yet, not clearly, not without the marred and mauled memories of Spiked One and pain and blood and sickening-wet heat and stolen, sullied orgasm. The offering to Qui-Gon he could never give—but still, but _still_ , clung to. Sacred . . .

He and Bant spoke of it, often enough, as the months went by. The quiet unfurling of flesh and blood, the pleasure-spiked synapses and parasympathetic needs. The struggle to control them, as a Jedi can control all such impulses—to a greater or lesser extent—but, too, the Healers’ insistence that he reacquaint himself with his own body, in his own time: that to reengage with it, fully, was—at least in part—to heal.

And what shelter Bant had been—who’d held him without judgment—who’d whispered soft-soothing words and held him until the shaking stopped, finding no fault in the heat of his cock or his cum when he couldn’t help _that_ , either—for the nightmares that triggered the response, that raised such loathing for himself of his own flesh that she let him dig his nails into her hands as he grasped them rather than tear at the fragile skin again—

Or, as time went on, for the dreams of Qui-Gon that began again to surface—

She bore those moments, all of them, with such compassion . . . even when, at times, he woke and in her silver eyes could see nothing but the bloodshot gaze of the woman who’d done what was done—in Bant’s carapaces and cartilage and flesh could feel nothing but the suffocating weight of breasts—or in the heat of his own cum, the residual twitching of his cock, could feel nothing else but . . . _her_.

But he suspects that there are things too much to ask of even the dearest friends, and wonders if those nights were so. And despite their talks, the honesty they’d been able to share with one another (for she knows his secret—ah—), now he finds himself so terribly lost.

It’s not merely the desire, but—

Everything. Everything feels shattered in such a new and terrible way. Before the Council’s summons, he had assumed it was merely his own body, his own mind. But now, he realizes—oh, it’s Qui-Gon’s, too. It’s not merely he who has glittering-sharp pieces to pick up with careful hands, through which to sift and reshape into something new (for what has been can never again be)—

Nor can either of them do so alone.

* * *

“What’s troubling you, Master?”

The thrum of the shuttle, the scrape of flimsy plasteel utensils over their double-portioned rations. Soon enough they’ll come to Dantooine, and their next meal might be long in coming. They’ve spoken not a word, not since Coruscant; Qui-Gon’s spent the entirety of their journey in the shuttle’s meager sleeping-quarters, deep in meditation. The bond has been fraught with unraveled worries and threads that Obi-Wan dares not follow—though he wonders, almost, if his Master _wants_ him to . . .

Qui-Gon glances up, looks hastily away, reaching through the bond for the threads, the knots, the tangled mess he’s made of it.

“Forgive me, Padawan,” he manages at last, idly crumbling a protein cake between his fingertips. “My behavior earlier . . . It was unbecoming of a Jedi . . . far more-so of a Master. There is no excuse for how I spoke to you . . . but . . . ”

Through the bond, ah, Obi-Wan’s presence: quiet, nimble, subtly worrying the knots. “If you wish to—tell me, Master. Please.”

Qui-Gon begins to tremble, and Obi-Wan reaches out at last, in flesh: fine-boned, strong-muscled hands, the callouses from training only beginning to return; Qui-Gon’s fingertips find so many blisters, much raw skin, that he almost dares not touch the younger man at all—until his Padawan squeezes his hand, no strength reserved, no flinch of pain.

But Qui-Gon can’t look him in the eyes.

“What happened is my fault.”

“How—ah, no—why do you think that, Master?”

And the words are so eerily like Kit’s—

But to Kit he could never speak the truth.

To Obi-Wan—

Qui-Gon shakes his head, teeth clenched.

“Show me.”

The grip on his hands has grown lax and begun to work at swollen knuckles, the rhythm echoed through the bond, the knowledge—raw, splinter-sharp—that yes, there are many things, both good and bad, for which there are no words. Moments between a Master and apprentice where nothing can be said—where the Force is the sole conduit. And if they are denied the closest connections most beings in the galaxy can know, oh, this is their sanctioned strength.

* * *

He sees himself through his Master’s eyes:

He is _beautiful_. Not for shallow flesh but through the Force, the whole of him—for all that’s been, for all he was before and is now and someday will, Force willing, be. For all the moments when he is both a frightened young man, clinging to his Master or his dearest friend—and for all the moments when he is a Jedi, with no fear for self at all—and for all the moments when the Obi-Wan with whom Qui-Gon first fell in love begins to show again through guarded cracks. And, too, when he is as good a stranger, taken someplace dark and distant, irrevocably so—

But he is not lost.

And he is so profoundly loved, in a way that the Council wouldn’t understand, nor for which there is room within the Code, nor does Qui-Gon himself fully comprehend. The profundity is dangerous. The meeting with the Council proved as much, though Master Yoda himself offered no outright condemnation . . .

And he is so profoundly wanted: not for the act, the basest lust, but something . . . transcendent . . . Or so Qui-Gon had told himself, had self-deceived, perhaps, because even after what's happened—dream though he might of spiritual ecstasy—the flesh still wants. And after what's been done, no, to lie to himself is nothing short sacrilege—is, he's sure, some other form of . . . ah . . .

And he all but hates himself for it.

* * *

 _< I love you. I should stop loving you. I _must _stop loving you. It has brought nothing but disgrace and betrayal of all that we are, all that we hold dear; I thought once that it was the will of the Force that someday—ah—what has it made of me but far less a Master, and what has it made of you—I fear— >_

 _< —has made me _more _, Master. > _Obi-Wan concentrates on tracing patters along the backs of Qui-Gon’s hands, hoping the latter’s trembling will hide his own. _< Please. Believe me when I say that. And when I say that to see you is to look upon a mirror . . . >_

_< Oh, Force . . . Forgive me, Obi-Wan; I’ve . . . failed you . . . >_

“No!”

The word catches on the shuttle’s thrum, the cutting of the engines as they drop from hyperspace near Dantooine. Obi-Wan glances hastily towards the cockpit. “Master—that’s not—”

Chatter sprays in crackled bursts over the comm system: the traffic around Dantooine is choked and the controllers are impatient to get everyone either onto the planet or back into space.

A glance, pleading, before the Force _surges_ between them, bitter-bright, and each lets go the other’s hands, bowing their heads a moment, reaching for the center of themselves. For the moment, then, they must do as the Code demands, and empty themselves, forsake themselves, for the good of the galaxy—for the good of all life—and again, however little they feel it, however much they are, be _what_ they are: Jedi, the selfless servants of the Light.


	7. Chapter 7

They gather themselves in bits and pieces, the conversation strung through stolen moments while they traverse Dantooine: most often in makeshift camps or places where they dare not sleep, for insect-riddled beds. They begin with the largest things, all the more to reflect the Light, to act as mirrors:

They love one another, deeply, in some way that was so fragilely defined, half-wrought at best, woven through the Code—or, at least, it was so before Obi-Wan’s capture. The past year, the wake of all that was wrenched from him, has tainted it: something they scarcely knew how to hold, how to look upon, lest they be blinded by it—and now it’s as a wounded thing, something as needs nursing back to health, no less than Obi-Wan’s body and mind.

Or Qui-Gon’s.

They spend the evening hours deep in thought one night, while camped at the edge of a compound, its occupants less-than-willing to supply even neutral conversations. The planet stirs them, long-grasses singing, ancient ruins whispering through the Force of all the Jedi who have come before. Men and women just as flawed as they.

At last Qui-Gon sighs, sparing the stars a lengthy, longing glance.

“I feel as if by loving you, still, I am no better than the ones who hurt you. For what my body wants, if I dare to consider it. Or if I dream.”

Obi-Wan picks idly at a blade of grass, ducking his head for a moment to disguise a half-lit smile. “When I first knew I was . . . in love with you . . . ah, no . . . just that I loved you . . . I hated myself for it. I felt as if my body betrayed me, then.” A pause, a shudder. “I felt the same thing, too, when she—”

Silence, the bond full of all that is unsaid.

“But she took that from you, against your will.” Qui-Gon shifts his gaze from the stars, watching his Padawan closely. “Never confuse the two, Obi-Wan. It was not your fault.”

“I know.” Softly, almost dreamily. A line he’s heard too many times, until it’s almost lost all meaning. “But Master, what I mean is . . . you shouldn’t hate yourself . . . not for what you can’t help, either. We’re not much different, are we? She’s stolen the same thing from both of us, in different ways . . .

“And if you need to hear _me_ say it, Master, as often you’ve told me—whatever you feel isn’t the same as what they did. You _must_ know that. It’s whole and it’s pure and it’s . . . Light. It’s what I wanted to give you, so badly.” Obi-Wan looks up to the stars himself, hoping to find something of whatever beauty he’s certain Qui-Gon sees. “It’s . . . still . . . what I want to give you. Somehow. Some way.”

_< Even though it’s broken and tainted and terrible, now.>_

_< Even though it’s beautiful, my Padawan.>_

“And I would take nothing.” Qui-Gon shifts nearer, holds out his hand—ever, always, the offering: ever, always, his Padawan’s choice. As warm, rough fingertips slip against his palm: _< But oh, I'd give you everything.>_

* * *

The sun rises, slowly, casting pale-gold light. They are staying in the upstairs room of a house, lent them by one friendly face amidst so many hostile masses, who seem to have little love for the Jedi. Qui-Gon is up first, and moves to stare out the window, cast aglow by the gathering sun. Obi-Wan watches him, struck by his grace, his beauty: the great strength of him, the broad body, the unkempt hair. How his hands rest easily against his hips, wide and swollen-veined in promised heat. The curled thicket at his groin. The lazy tilt of his half-hard cock.

The rest of him cast into blue-tinged shadow.

Obi-Wan curls up within his robe, wide-eyed, silent, his own cock aching, trailing precum against his thigh. And the moment, in its own way, almost makes him smile—for it reminds him of so many mornings, oh, so many times when the situation had been as this, and his only worry had been that his Master would find out his . . . predicament.

And there, the passing shadow, the half-memory of what-has-been. He inhales, slowly, holding the scents of the room, the warmth of the coming day, the welcoming sun, the sight of his Master, watching the dawn. Yes, there’s the Darkness that mars the years, the moments, between then and—

But how can he abide in darkness now? If only for _this_ moment . . . _this_ , the Force-given—

And so he blinks and watches the wind play with Qui-Gon’s hair and wishes _he_ could be the one to tousle it and welcomes, almost—ah—yes— _welcomes_ the needful ache of his cock.

* * *

Their hands brush one day when they’re walking through a city. Half-mumbled apologies along the bond, heat-flushed cheeks, a stuttered step—and the Force as good as laughing.

* * *

And, once, at the middle of a long-edged night, buttressed by two days of such heat that their tunics are plastered to their backs, Qui-Gon watches Obi-Wan shake himself from a nightmare, the kind that once used to leave him screaming. He can feel its echoes through the bond, can see his Padawan studying himself for a moment in the moonlight, before rolling to his feet and standing before the wide-flung window, welcoming the darkness, hoping to coax some breeze into the little room.

Qui-Gon tracks the moonlight along the young man’s frame—thick bones and corded muscle, overlaid in places, still, with softness. The Master’s eyes trail along his face, at peace—oh, so beautifully at peace—and down along his chest, the curve of his belly, the cock that hangs quiescent, as if at last his body is beginning to learn that such savage memories are no cause for kindled need.

He traces, too, the scars that wax silver in the moonlight, torn jaggedly along the fragile skin of Obi-Wan’s cock. He wishes he could stand and hold the young man in his arms—to have the courage or the foolishness. But as-yet he dares not . . . ah. Not yet.

* * *

“Do you think there are provisions in the Code for love?”

Obi-Wan swallows a mouthful of bitter, pungent tea, studying his Master by the flickering firelight. They sit together, side-by-side, conscious of the glancing touches, saying nothing. “Perhaps. Does our call to self-sacrifice, the existence not of chaos but harmony, not suggest as much?”

“Does our service to the Force, the Light, our being vessels of its will—does that not engender love?” Qui-Gon smiles, lapsing into silence for a long moment. “Perhaps what the Masters have warned us against is not love, but _being_ in love. Or _falling_ in love. That sounds like a possessive thing . . . and love would not be possessed.”

“No. To be possessive, to be jealous, to want another for the sake of having them . . . I hardly find that love, Master.”

“Hm. Nor I.”

 _< And us?> _The soft-shifted glance of an indigo eye, the firelight playing with the bristles of Qui-Gon’s beard.

_< I am not in love, Master . . . >_

Obi-Wan can feel the blood beginning to beat at his throat, can feel the Force singing through the grass and the wood and the flames, through the slow-quickening of his body that has been building since they set foot on Dantooine, even with his mind fixed firmly on the mission, on the information, on the grim reality of mercenaries’ trade in beings and flesh and blood—and sometimes, too, in bones.

This is Qui-Gon, after all, who is so close to him. With whom he’s shared a bed. With whom he’s shared the Darkness and the Light. Qui-Gon, who would never hurt him. Qui-Gon who asks questions before everything, who moves with slow, soft-gentle gestures. Qui-Gon, so beautiful and fragile and flawed and kind and _good_.

He leans close, and smells smoke and stale sweat and the fabric of his Master’s tunic, bearing still the heat of the day, and at last he presses his lips just along Qui-Gon’s, _there_ , the corner, before he feels them quirk in a quivering smile.

One broad hand takes his, holds it.

Obi-Wan tilts his head, just _so_ , and their lips slip together, oh, and everything is feather-light and the softness of Qui-Gon’s breath against his cheek and his body begs _more_ and the pulse in Qui-Gon’s hands runs quick and bright and if he were to stop and think, yes, there is the Darkness in his mind, threatening to swallow him with the memory of her lips—but that was harsh and she tasted like spice and Qui-Gon tastes like tea and oh—but this, but Light—

_< . . . but I still love.>_

* * *

It begins with such as this: the kiss by the fireside. Surreptitious tangling of hands within the ample sleeves of their robes. Glances given when no one looks. Touches cast along the bond, as songs, as ripples, eddies echoing back without end.

* * *

It begins with such as this: the many nights Obi-Wan’s shared Qui-Gon’s sleep-couch in the Temple—or his bed in whatever room they find—or his outspread robe, when the night sky is all the vault above their heads—and slowly, slowly, the gathering heat becomes something they can look at. Becomes welcomed. Becomes held, treated with awe, treated with respect, as if a weapon. For a weapon it can be, and terrible at that.

* * *

It begins with such as this: Qui-Gon waking one morning to find Obi-Wan asleep, sprawled out atop him, warm and heavy and hard, completely relaxed, completely at peace, the Force some shroud to wrap around them both, warmer than sunlight and not nearly so glaring-bright. He has one of Qui-Gon’s knuckles pressed against his lip, and the Master places a kiss at the crown of his head, painfully aware of the desire rapidly spiraling out of control. They’ve held it for so long—it would take so little—but this, for whatever it may be, the act must be delicate and conscious, something to which they give no less of themselves than for training or sparring or meditation—it must be as a trance, a prayer—

And the day is come. And they have work to do.

_< Awake, Padawan. It’s time to get up.>_

* * *

It begins with such as this: Obi-Wan sleepily fumbling through the darkness, half-asleep, to kiss Qui-Gon on the lips—and then, on impulse, to reach out, to seek, to taste: to trail his tongue just _there_ , to catch a mewling shattered moan risen from his Master’s throat, to feel Qui-Gon’s lips part gently, quietly, and he slips therein and it’s soft and warm and his eyes roll and this, this, this soft-gentle-sweet-goodness _-yes_ , this is what a kiss is supposed to be, and the Darkness has _nothing_ on this, oh, this sweet-sacred-beautiful- _Light_.

* * *

It begins with such as this: with meditation, ah, keen-bright-agony, the bond raw and trembling. It begins with the promise of the sacred, with the vaulted sway of the living Force, the primal, the same song that sings through beings’ blood and grass and stones and sets the stars aright. The quiet unraveling— _oh_ —

* * *

It begins with such as this:

They do not speak. There are no words, can _be_ no words. Words were used against him—as was silence.

The bond, alone, is _theirs._

_< If you tell me to stop, we stop.>_

Obi-Wan nods, knows Qui-Gon means more than merely _stop_ —means all the ways his Master’s come to recognize the touch of the Darkness—the marks of the memories. The way his muscles tense, or his eyes grow distant, or his face becomes a mask, no more—innumerable minutiae—

And for all that, for many nights, they whisper nothings, tease kisses, but do no more—but sleep—but wake to the other’s hardness—but tremble and shift and oh, Force, the _friction_ —

But ah, they’ve woken and the day beckons and the mission—

They are Jedi, yet, and even to this . . . they will not so lose themselves.

* * *

It begins with such as this: a woman in one of the marketplaces had called out to Obi-Wan, had come to brush against him, had parted her tunic to press her breasts against his ribs. Qui-Gon had noticed they were heavy, as if she’d nursed children, and that saddened him more than her display, or how she’d laughed at the sight of his bewildered Padawan. Surely she knew she’d get no credits from either of them—was that, then, the point? Solely? To say she’d tempted one of such as they—commonly called a warrior-monk, a celibate servant of the Light?

That night, then, camped on the edge of the ancient city that has no room for such as they, half-buried in the long-grass, and Obi-Wan begins to grind against him, frantically, and Qui-Gon’s composure breaks and oh, Force, yes, he _needs_ —

But the Force cries out in warning, the bond full of jagged edges, agony—dark-strung desperation that leaves sickness in the Master’s throat—how could he have been so blind as to not see that this—no—this could never be—

 _< Wrongwrong_wrong _like her like her like_ her _I need I_ need _but please oh please Master please it’s oh Force_ I can’t _please help me stop help me stop Master please_ help me _— >_

_< Hush, now—peace, now, Padawan—here, come here, be still—>_

Tenderly he pushes Obi-Wan back, curling his legs beneath him, clamping down on the base needs of his body as if a vice, as if this one moment will be his offering, always, his act of love—and so, perhaps, it is—even as his cock twitches of its own accord and he can feel precum trailing down its length—even as the cusp of orgasm, denied, becomes real _pain_ —

Carefully he catches Obi-Wan’s trembling hands, offers a rhythm to the young man’s choked-gasping breath—the shattered moans that catch against his throat that break his heart because they’re not the cries of love—

_< Breathe through the pleasure, Padawan, as if it were pain—this pleasure wrought from Darkness—it hurts, yes, doesn’t it? Then breathe, Obi-Wan: inhale the Light, exhale the Darkness, ah, let the whole of it be set to drift on the waters of the Force—let the Light burn away all that is wrong, all that’s been done—let it go—it does not control you—let the Force lift you, here, see, here I am, I’ll always be—find me; reach me; here, just here—you’re safe—you’re safe—>_

Slowly, the rhythm caught and kept: slowly the tremors cease: slowly the flesh quietens, the young man’s cock grown quiescent and still, and cerulean eyes, when opened at last, are clear and bright and sorrow-filled.

“I hated her, for just a moment,” Obi-Wan whispers hoarsely.

Qui-Gon purses his lips, doesn’t know what to say, doesn’t know even if his Padawan means the woman from the marketplace or the woman from the station—or if it even matters. Or if—as Obi-Wan settles back into his arms, chaste and demur and exhausted, as he drifts into a restive sleep—he’d dare to tell his Padawan that once he’d felt the same.

And the night wears on and the ache does not leave him; Qui-Gon clings to the rhythm of his breath but the orgasm that had nearly been and has been building for weeks, for months, for a year, creeps back along his nerves, his spine, his cock, his hands—

Rough fingertips gouge a trench in heat-baked soil and he shudders once, untouched, and spills himself therein and it’s desperate and sickening and _hollow_ and he hastily shifts the dirt back from whence it came, burying the sacrilegious seed.

When at last he sleeps, he dreams that the seed sends down piercing roots into his body and some twisted tree that poisons the soil grows from him—and that he cannot move, or speak, but possesses still his sight and the Force and something whispers, yes, this sacrifice pays for his sacrilege—

And in the dream, Obi-Wan looks down at him—the broken, bloodied Obi-Wan—with nothing but disgust scrawled across his face.

* * *

It begins with such as this: Obi-Wan wakes to warm sun and heated soil and feels consciousness begin to stir his Master’s body, oh, and tentatively, tenderly, he reaches out to lay his hand along the sacred root of Qui-Gon’s cock.


	8. Chapter 8

It ends with such as this:

The thrum of the shuttle, streaking through hyperspace-torn stars back to Coruscant: the Temple: the Council—for they have much to tell, and not much of it good—and whatever missions are to come. Plasteel is a far cry from soil or grass or makeshift beds. And Dantooine was full of summer heat and storm-squalls: the recycled air of the shuttle is bitter and cold.

But it is good. Is good.

They sit, knee-to-knee, in one of the narrow bunks: Obi-Wan with his back to the wall, Qui-Gon with his back to the door—ah—because he knows his Padawan feels safest when he can always keep his eye on the entrance to a room. They sit, for the moment, clothed in robes and tunics and trousers that are clean but hardly so—that still bear the lingering stiffness and sour scent of long-dried sweat. It would take proper water—or a cleaning-droid—to freshly launder them. One of the many comforts of the Temple to look forward to.

The meager sonic shower, too, has done little for their bodies—but enough. Not that either man would notice—ah, they’ve spent too much time together, been too close, to notice such as the smell of unwashed flesh. Qui-Gon’s hair is thick with grease; there’s dirt under Obi-Wan’s fingernails, grown long. What paltry, shallow things.

But the shuttle is not Dantooine, and whatever strange refuge they had found there for themselves is quickly being stripped away: days will bring them back to Coruscant, to the Temple, to what, perhaps, they will never know again but for stolen moments—ah—and could they really live their lives like that? But something stills them, something gives them pause: the gravity, the ripples through the Force, the echoes of the moment-yet-to-come, and all it mends and all it sunders . . . For all the yearning, for all the Light to burn away the shadows, for all the love and the lust of the flesh, the act will alter all, irrevocably.

* * *

It ends with such as this: with silence, with uncertainty, with all the harm that's been done and all the weight of what might come.

* * *

It ends, too, with such as this:

 _< Master. I’m . . . not sure I want this.> _A long-drawn pause, and Obi-Wan cups his Master’s hands beneath his own, as if to still the trembling. _< Not . . . not that. I _do _. I want. But . . . >_

The memories of all they shared on Dantooine drift back to Qui-Gon in a quick-strung whorl: each quiet thing, borne of all that was, borne of the circumstances, of the sun, the moon, their warmth, the closeness, oh . . . Moments such as that cannot be fabricated from nothing, not even raw desire. They must be led into such things, gently, the both of them . . .

_< The expectation of it, Padawan?>_

_< Yes. I think. I don’t know. But I’m suddenly afraid, Master.>_

To his surprise this earns him a low chuckle: hoarse, caught on jagged edges, needful and mindful of its needfulness.

_< As am I, Obi-Wan . . . but we need do nothing, you know. Not now. Not ever. Do you remember when I said that if you said stop, we would stop?>_

_< Yes, Master.>_

_< This can be that moment, Padawan. For now. Forever. And there can be _many _moments such as this—many times we . . . stop. I promise you. By the Force, I swear—no matter when—no matter what. >_

Obi-Wan thinks back to all they shared, those sacred-cocooned moments, those fragments, oh, blurring into something whole and bright and to revisit any such thing is to stir him, to leave him aching, to catch his breath and yes, he can hear Qui-Gon’s breathing catch the same . . . Sleep-soft moments, and moments bright as the spark of a flame, and dark as the nights when rainless clouds snuffed out moon and stars.

There was the mission, of course, which would inevitably end—but for those moments it seemed as if they had all the time in the galaxy.

What have they now? A shuttle, plasteel, durasteel, full-throated engines, and hyperspace-struck stars? But for the cockpit they cannot even see the darkness—

Wearily he sighs, leans back against the bulkhead.

 _< It would do good to get some sleep, I think. For both of us.> _Qui-Gon’s hands slip free from his, enfold them, squeeze them gently. _< A state of weariness is never one in which to make decisions, hm?>_

* * *

It ends with such as this:

The bunk is too small, but so was Qui-Gon’s sleep-couch at the Temple, and in both instances they’ve managed to find enough room, regardless. Qui-Gon awakens to the shuttle as it was, disoriented, ah, no time here, no play of stars or sun to warm the skin . . . but there, but warm against him, skin-to-skin, is Obi-Wan: soft and steady and sure, a quiet blue-dawn radiance within the semi-darkness, ah, the Force gives light to _everything_ . . .

Quietly he reaches out, untucks Obi-Wan’s braid from where it’s become stuck between their bodies . . . the passing whisper of his Padawan’s breath dropped to a hum, the languid, stocky body shifting, the hardness caught in the crook of his thigh . . . those cerulean eyes opened slowly . . . an unhurried smile creeping across the boyish face he knows and loves so well.

_< Hello there, Master.>_

_< Hm, Padawan.>_

They lay thus for a long time: still and silent, warm and safe and whole, caught between the tresses of wakefulness and sleep, consciousness and a meditative trance—the Light flowing through the crude matter, its eddies and ebbs and flows finding echoes in the quiet-soft affirmations of the flesh.

* * *

It ends with such as this:

There are no pretenses. No hopes. Expectations belong to the realm of possessive love—and _that_ , more than such love as they share—such love that lurks within the nuances of the Code—is unbecoming of a Jedi.

The days slip into hours into minutes into time beyond measure, the way space travel can with no markers but _chronos._ It does them good, perhaps, this timelessness: letting go of Dantooine’s rotation: letting go of the flurry of activity that will await them when they land on Coruscant: a few days at the Temple and then somewhere new. Together. Hopefully with the Council’s faith restored—if only just.

And they slip, themselves, into a state simply of being. Quietly orbiting one another like binary stars.

And for that, from that, is kindled what they knew:

Shy, quiet glances. The brushing of hands. Subtle touches, whispers through the bond not of words but more than words, the depths of them, as thoughts, as songs. And what time they spend in repose, in meditation if not sleep, as it was: wrapped up in each other’s arms, their pulses finding the same rhythm, their bodies instinctively nestled together, two halves of a whole.

And for that, from that, at last, the wellspring sprung.

* * *

It ends with such as this:

Tomorrow will bring them to Coruscant.

Obi-Wan knows this, somewhere distantly, and considers it, and wonders if it has something to do with why he grasps Qui-Gon so tightly to him, why he straddles the larger man’s hips until his own thighs begin to quiver at the brushing of their cocks, why he listens for a long, long time to the ocean’s tide of his Master’s breath: gathering swells, the heart beneath the flesh and ribs beneath himself, in kind, pounding with abounding, tempered life.

As at the fireside, he teases out that secret kiss from the corner of his Master’s lips, feels them quirk into a half-smile before he tilts his head and there, just there, and again the Light surges through him, tangled with desire, purifying it, purifying all of him, keeping the Darkness at bay because this is Qui-Gon and Qui-Gon is Light and life and love and _love_ and—

A trailing of the tongue, no more, that’s all the asking, ah, the bond even now becomes far less of a thing shared between two beings and something else, something elusive, something amorphous in such a sacred way—a losing of oneself, wholly, to the Light—

Qui-Gon’s begun to shake beneath him and Obi-Wan feels his Master’s hips begin to catch, to stumble into motion, oh, and those broad-rough-familiar-sacred-hands that had lain flat against his shoulder-blades begin to slowly, so terribly slowly and gently, stroke up and down his back, slipping on occasion to pause, splayed against his buttocks, quivering, asking, always asking—questions before everything—

He offers, in answer, another brush of his tongue, teasing, a question of his own.

And Qui-Gon’s lips part and down he sinks into warmth and quiet wetness and sometimes the snare of teeth because neither of them knows, really, what they’re doing, and it doesn’t matter, this is soft and safe and sure and _Light_ and nothing of the Darkness was ever gentle or good and this is Qui-Gon, who is _good_ , and he catches every whimper-spun-moan pouring from his Master’s throat, oh, Force, and the hands stroking his back ask over and over, inviting, whispering, _Please, please, join this dance with me—_

* * *

The friction alone is enough, the friction and the kiss and Obi-Wan’s heat and the press of the younger man’s erection there against him and oh, oh, yes, _this—_

Qui-Gon breaks the kiss but to throw back his head and let the shudders catch the cry as he cums, spilling himself in messy rivulets between them: this is the orgasm that was meant to be, not the sacrilege on Dantooine, not the seed buried in the soil—

And he cums and he _cums_ and he’s going to again it never ends, a lull, perhaps, but oh, but oh, this means more than all the waiting, all the longing, all and everything and—

_< Love, oh, love, oh, love—>_

The quiet, secret thing, ah, that he will never say, for love does not possess—

_My love—_

* * *

Obi-Wan buries his hands in the tresses of Qui-Gon’s greasy hair, thick, oily, he doesn’t care (but oh, someday he wants to do this when it’s soft and there might never be another day as this and so he’ll hold onto this forever—let this moment last forever—let it find its way into his dreams, let it stray into his waking thoughts, let all he sees remind him of such as this—of the man he loves—of the all-consuming Light—)

He feels the pulse of his Master’s cock as he cums and within moments again and Obi-Wan's eyes roll back and there’s no darkness now but blinding lights and oh, Force, the hands still stroking at his back dig into his hips and will him closer still and it’s all so exquisitely gentle and desperate and he begins to rock against Qui-Gon at last and he remembers now to breathe and everything is Light and everything everything _everything_ is this and he and Qui-Gon and Qui-Gon smells like sweat and firewood and smoke and his lips are soft and his beard is full of bristles and the tangled thatch at his groin is oh so much the same, and his skin is smooth and soft and warm and Obi-Wan buries his head in the crook of his Master’s neck, clutching now with white-knuckled hands, tangled-haired, at the plasteel of the bunk—sobbing, now, the Light-struck heartsong, oh—thrusting in broken-innocent rough earnestness—

_< Master please oh Force I want this oh I want this please I love I love I love—>_


End file.
